Computer based learning techniques have become increasingly popular due to their versatility and cost effectiveness. For example, computer based military simulators are used by the military to develop and maintain operational proficiency of military personnel. Evaluating how a student performed is an important factor in determining the effectiveness of the learning technique. One approach used to evaluate a students performance is with an intelligent tutoring system. In an intelligent tutoring system, the progress of a student at different steps or tasks to complete a goal is compared to the progress at the different steps of an expert in completing the goal. This allows the evaluator to determine the efficiency of the student in reaching the goal in real time and provides various times to provide feedback to the student to enhance the learning experience.
Although, the intelligent tutoring real time provides information regarding the ability of the student, it does not provide any insight into the internal states of the student such as the students working memory load or the student's attention level. This type of information is critical in determining how the student is able to learn and in determining an effective way to teach a particular student.
For the reasons stated above and for other reasons stated below which will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading and understanding the present specification, there is a need in the art for an effective and efficient tutoring system that takes into consideration the internal states of the student during a test.